Mr. Prahlad Kakkar
Chairman, India SME Forum
Mr. Prahlad Kakar started his career in advertising in 1970 in ASP Delhi. He is the Founder and Director of Genesis Film Production Pvt. Ltd., one of the leading production houses in India. Prahlad virtually invented a genre of television advertising in the years that followed. He has ruled the advertising world with his brand of irreverent humor, memorable brand building campaigns and has created Award winning commercials for the most reputed Corporates and agencies in India and the Asia Pacific region. “To tell a story in 30 secs in the most engaging way possible” remains Prahlad’s raison d’être for his continued passion for ad filmmaking, even 38 years later. Known as the “Ad guru” he has been instrumental in changing the face of advertising in our country bringing in the appropriate “regional Indianness” and values into an urban context through his films, creative workshops, articles and interviews. Today the innovative corporate, Ad guru, Branding Strategist, Chief Mentor and Board member of India SME Forum is involved in providing innovative 360 degree solutions consulting with Small and Medium Companies and brand building various products and services. Creative workshops, Motivational, Marketing, Branding and Leadership interactive sessions for Entrepreneurs, middle management and top management executives in providing marketing solutions and focusing on the Company’s growth story apart from consulting with various government agencies and institutions to strategize and deal with current issues and future challenges. His newest venture PKSBE (Prahlad Kakar School of Branding and Entrepreneurship) in which he is spearheading the organization of innovative education in the field of entrepreneurship, Media, and film making. This program encourages students to overcome fear and free their minds to develop creative strategies and perform to their optimum, embracing risk as an integral part of doing Business. A unique syllabus explored by none other in the field of education and entrepreneurship .He is the driving force behind single handedly creating focused, imaginative, successful professionals over the last 3 decades .Today he brings all his 38 years of experience and enthusiasm under one roof at PKSBE.
Mr. J.S. Juneja,
Vice Chairman, India SME Forum
Dr. J S Juneja has a unique experience in the public & private sector managements and worked diligently for the SME development, policy formulation & advocacy, institutional capacity building & restructuring, entrepreneurship development for over three decades. Promoting investments and joint ventures from India to other countries of Asia and Africa especially to Mauritius and Botswana. Provided management consultancy to the Governments of Egypt, UAE (Dubai), Kenya, Sri Lanka and several other countries of Asia & Africa, United Nations organizations, Commonwealth Secretariat etc. He is Vice President of WUSME, Chairman of SME Committee & ; Past President of AIMA and former Chairman of NSIC. An MBA from University of Oregon, USA and Doctoral Degree in Applied Economics from the University of Bombay. He has been Visiting Professor to the University of Rhode Island, USA and IIT, New Delhi. Dr Juneja has written extensively and recently authored &;SMEs in Asian Region- Harnessing the Growth Potential & and Policy Guidebook for SME Development in Asia and the Pacific & edited and published by United Nation ESCAP.
Mr. Tilak Raj Bajalia
Member of the Board, India SME Forum
Mr. Bajalia is an Economics graduate with ICWA and Certified Associate of Indian Institute of Bankers. He started his career in a commercial bank in 1974 and moved to IDBI in 1983. During his about 30 years stay in IDBI he handled varied portfolio viz. Corporate & ; Retail finance, Recovery & ; NPA Management, Restructuring, Human Resource Management, etc. He set up Recovery Vertical and SME Vertical in IDBI. In Corporate Banking he handled Infra projects, Paper, Textile, Engineering, Mining Industry. He headed the Branch Office at Jaipur & ; Largest Branch of IDBI Mumbai. He headed HRD function of IDBI during its transformation into a Commercial Bank portfolio after 2011. Prior to appointment as DMD in SIDBI, Mr. Bajalia was the Executive Director of IDBI Ltd.
Mr. Vinod Kumar
Senior Partner & Country Manager India & Middle East SDRC
Starting his career in international collaborations and projects, in 1989, saw Vinod at the nerve centre of various successful Joint Ventures and Collaborations in Electronics & ; Telecom, Media & ; Publishing, Industrial & ; Consumer Electronics, Hospitality and Finance, with Multinational corporations entering India through the FDI route. Vinod started out as a technology entrepreneur to lead the development & ; successful sale of an indigenous developed navigation and geographic information system, based tracking patent and business, to a Russian Space and GIS Conglomerate. As an Investor he presently invests in profitable, innovative, Small and Medium Companies. Vinod leads his investor group in Risk Profiling, Assessing Growth Potential and deciding on Investment for Seed and Venture Financing to MSMEs in innovative and disruptive technologies, apart from day to day overseeing and leading extensive research and analysis of linkages, growth potential and market factors of SMEs involved in over 29 clusters across 11 Sectors including Food Processing, Dairy, Leather, Pharma, Engineering and Automotive in over 19 states of India. As an investor and mentor, with a passion for growing innovative and disruptive brick and mortar, Small and Medium companies with a high growth trajectory, Vinod, supervises and mentors investments of over 135 m $ apart from mentoring over two hundred Entrepreneurs, across various sectors under the India SME Forum’s Mentor 4 Entrepreneur Program along with Ad Guru Prahlad Kakar. Vinod’s experience in startups, seed, equity & development financing and capacity building of MSMEs has successfully lead to innovative strategies in equity & ; growth capital investments in SMEs apart from the development of successful strategies for a nationwide Capacity Building Framework at the India SME Forum. Vinod passionately addresses and conducts workshops, motivational seminars and leadership sessions for Small and Medium Entrepreneurs and currently serves as the Honorary President at the India SME Forum, apart from advising various government agencies and institutions to strategize and deal with current issues and future challenges. Vinod is member of the Board of World Union of SMEs headquartered in San Marino, nominated as a Member of India’s Central Bank, the Reserve Bank of India& ;s Standing Advisory Committee on Flow of Institutional Credit to MSME Sector under the Financial Inclusion Development Department and is also a nominated member on the High Powered Monitoring Committee under National Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe Hub under StandUp India of the Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises of the Government of India. Vinod has a Graduate Engineering Degree in Electronics and Telecommunication & a Masters in Business Administration.
Mr. Ravinder Bhan
Member of the Board, India SME Forum
Internationally experienced Business Leader and Consultant having contributed to Growth and Value at businesses from India, Europe and Middle East, For over two decades, Ravinder, contributed at several companies in the region to grow and deliver real business results year after year. This included small, medium and large organization spread over 25 years, be it big giants like Crompton Greaves, Larsen & Toubro, Schneider or GE; medium sized manufacturers like Jyoti Ltd. Voltamp Switchgear, or small organizations like Delta Engineering, Uptime Engineers, High Volt Electricals & Hirect Engg. Extensively experienced in Strategic Marketing, Change Management, Human Capital, Finance, Supply Chain, Project Management and Manufacturing processes, Ravinder is an Effective Team Builder, Trainer and mentor with a passion to bring out the best out of People. A top level professional net-worker-linked personally with over a thousand top notch professionals from across the globe. Aggressive Initiative leader for making quick, visible and yet seamless transformation from 'business as usual' to "businesses that matter" even in a Not for Profit Organization/ Industry Association bringing enhanced value to all stake holders.
Mr. Nitin Wali
Head Business Development - Asia Pacific Verisign Services India Pvt. Ltd.
With over 17 years in the technology industry, Nitin has worked with leading multi national organizations such as IBM, Intel and Oracle where he has held various roles across Marketing, Project Management, Sales and Alliances. In his present role at Verisign, Nitin is responsible for business development to drive mobile internet growth in the Asia Pacific region. His key focus has been on identifying innovative technology solutions and business models which could enhance the end user Internet experience. Nitin has been leveraging his strong network in the Asia Pacific region which includes telecom carriers, e/m-commerce companies, technology leaders, digital media, PR, industry associations and governments to pilot out services, build new revenue streams and chart out a sustainable strategic road map for growth in the region.Entrepreneurial and passionate in spirit, he is keen to talk to anyone with a good business idea and is also a pro bono advisor to technology start ups.
Mr. Ajay Thakur
Head -BSE SME
A professional with more than 18 years of experience in Capital Market spanning India’s biggest Custodian to India’s biggest and largest Stock Exchange. Ajay has been instrumental in setting up the depository by the regional stock exchange, developing derivatives market and setting up the SME Platform. Ajay started the career way back in 1994 with Stock Holding Corporation Ltd as Senior Executive - Market operation. After working for one year joined Vadodara Stock Exchange in 1995 as Senior Management Executive looking after various departments viz Market Operations, Bad Delivery Cell and Auction. He was also assigned with the role to set up depository by VSE Ltd.He joined BSE Ltd in December, 1996 as Head – Arbitration and Business Development. He has developed the derivatives segment of BSE Ltd and also actively involved in opening of regional centers across the country. Presently as Head - BSE SME, responsible for the development of this segment of BSE Ltd. He very successfully launched the SME Platform on 13th March, 2012 and thus become the first Exchange to launch the Platform. Today BSE Ltd is the market leader in this segment with ninety percent market share. Within six months this platform has 13 companies listed and axnother 7 companies are to get listed. The success of this platform has brought a lot of enthusiasm in the market and more and more companies and market intermediaries are coming forward to get the companies listed on this platform.
Mr. Sanjay Jain
T.T. Limited
TT Textile was established 65 years ago as a small textile company and underwent the ups and down of the textile business as did many others. Sanjay, took over the responsibility from his family and has planned and driven the growth of TT Group creating a large scale yarn manufacturing enterprise, ranking among the top in India. Setting new bench marks in the garments industry, the group has ventured into ‘Mega-projects’ in cotton yarn and raw cotton. Sanjay's visionary approach to ring-spun yarn production and a commitment to invest in latest technology made TT one of India's most innovative textile companies. His leadership has made T.T. group, essentially the only "Cotton" company which is already on the world Cotton scene.
Mr. Amitesh Singh
Suman Forwarding Agency
Mr. Amitesh, joined forces with his father to kickstart a logistics firm, in 2000, given his entrepreneurial thirst. From a humble transportation company to emerging as a trend-setter providing customised solutions in the sector of multi-modal transportation and logistics, rising virtually from scratch to pegging a turnover of Rs.200 crore in over a decade, SFAPL and Singh have certainly come a very, long way. States Amitesh, “The joy of being part of the supply chain that finds a way into the lives of people, directly or indirectly by way of supplies seemed to be a great achievement in itself.”Considered a trend-setter in rail, road and water transportation and value-added support, their expertise lies in providing customised solutions to meet the requirements of any business, emphasizing on functionality, deliverability and flexibility.
Ms. Sangita Palshikar
SKP Bearings
Sangita was born in a maharashtrian middle class family in Pune and in the year 1992 her family moved to Wadhwan, Surendranagar. She saw an opportunity in the availability of highly accomplished mechanical skilled workers in abundance & founded SKP Bearing Industries to manufacture needle roller, cylindrical roller and special purpose pins. Sangita had her fair share of resistance from her peers, as her choice of work, has been a traditional male dominated industry, however she proved her acumen by sheer hard work and huge sense of commitment. Sangita believes in taking care of the Eco-system and it is reflected in the way the company carried out the mission of water re-circulation, water harvesting and achieved Zero Carbon status. In 2011, Sangita received the SPECIAL MENTION AWARD as an Outstanding Women Entrepreneur, from the President of India.
Mr. Amit Mehra
Medico Electrodes
Mr. Starting by joining his fathers Medical Recording Paper trading business, Amit commissioned the first factory, in 1995, for manufacturing ECG Chart paper. It was his vision for the future that he ventured into the manufacturing of disposable ECG Electrodes in 2002 and success fueled his passion to move the manufacturing activities to a much bigger “state of the art” facility to Noida SEZ in the year 2006. Today they manufacture a full range of latex free ECG Electrodes for all cardiac monitoring and diagnostic procedures and are supplying to over 30 countries. With a constant endeavour to grow in 2015, the company acquired 100% shares in Ambu White Sensors Ltd., a UK based manufacturer of Tab Electrodes, Electrosurgical Plates and Hydrogel from Ambu A/s. The acquisition consisted of two manufacturing plants in Warwick, UK, thus providing a multi-national base to the company. With the acquisition, the company has taken one more step towards achieving its goal of selling a Billion ECG Electrodes per Year by 2020. Amit's exemplary leadership, hard work & dedication is a case study for entrepreneurship.
Mr. Ajay Sood
Kumar Exports
The foundation of the Kumar Group was laid down by the late T.N. Sood as a modest unit with a primary investment of Rs.100/- during the year 1952. The maiden product crafted was pulleys, manufactured with the help of a lathe machine. Ajay carried and built on the legacy further, adding casting, forging and precision turned components to boast of an asset value today, of around 100 Crores. With an enviable track record and established credentials as exporters and manufacturers of machined castings, forgings and precision turned components, Kumar Exports serves national and overseas OEMs, majorly catering to the automotive industry and the agriculture sector. They have achieved zero PPM in exports since the last many years, creating an impeccable export track record without any returns, cancellations or defects.
Ms. Mohini Kelkar
Grind Master Machines
Mohini Kelkar along with her husband Milind Kelkar , both production engineers from the famed Victoria Jubilee Technical Institute (V.J.T.I) in Mumbai, started Grind Master in 1984 by producing the first cookware polishing machine for Nirlep. Ddeveloping indigenous metal finishing machines from a rented garage at Aurangabad, employing just one person was a tough task. It was in 2000, however, when the company found its scintillating métier: Micro-finishing. As original equipment manufacturers, they compete with top German and Japanese companies and are still the preferred choice for many global players, because of their unique approach- believing in the policy that 100 – 1 = zero! Mohini says, "The brand is based on trust, innovation and expertise, If a customer gets one percent less from our expertise, it amounts to zero, for us.” With a dedicated R & D team developing breakthrough technologies for over 30 years, the company today has emerged as an ace exporter to China, UK, US, Mexico, Middle East and South-east Asia, selling over 4000 machines, worldwide.
Mr. Arun Prakash
Genetix Biotech Asia
Realising that an M.B.B.S degree wasn’t going to be his lot, Arun Prakash opted for a career in the pharmaceutical and chemical industry, amassing experience over a span of few years. In the interim, however, Prakash stumbled upon a significant lacuna between the medical products and services that Indian customers were facing from their suppliers. And it is thereon, that he identified the vocation of his life. Coming from a non-business background and a first-generation entrepreneur he started the business with very little money. The import regulations were very tough then, and not many would dare to put their money and effort into such a business. But with the unique cutting edge technology and best product mix, he has always been 5-10 years ahead of the competition, in terms of quality and logistic support. In 2010, he created the ‘Genetix Brand’ and in 2011, diversified into core healthcare with medical devices with the formation of ‘365 Medical’ for distribution of products for Advance Wound Management, Critical Care and Ostomy. Generally regarded as a ‘First Doer’ in the global market in many respects, he was the first to create a completely new business model in the biotech industry. Genetix Biotech was the first company in Life Sciences to start warehousing products , the only one to come up with the first Catalogue in 1996. Also, the first company in the Life Sciences market that provided over 10,000 SKUs from their inventory. Apart from offering a platform to a number of young new entrepreneurs, Arun has and continues to provide employment to hundreds of highly-educated people.
Ms. Sarita Sarvria
Express Housekeepers
At 28, Sarita Sarvria – an employee with the Taj Group Of Hotels - discovered that she’d been bitten by the entrepreneurial bug! And it was a visit to London in the 1980s, that helped crystallise her business direction. The high standards of facility management services captivated her psyche and Sarita soon realised that this was her true calling. In the late 1980s, Sarvria, a first-generation entrepreneur, green-lighted her firm Perspective Services with a humble capital of Rs. 25,000, hiring 10 trained housekeeping boys and a single supervisor. Procuring contracts was an uphill task, since the concept of facility management services was labour centered. A decade of experience in the hospitality sector had strengthened her resolve to “start a novel and unique business in the corporate sector” and Sarvria’s firm later assumed the identity of Express Housekeeper Pvt. Ltd. in 2004. She started with 10 employees and aims to make the company’s presence felt globally, with over 25000 employees, today and a top line of hundreds of Crores.
Mr. Sudhir Gupta
Advance Hydrau-Tech
In 1979,he had completed Chartered Accountancy and was asked by one of his relatives to join his manufacturing unit. Sudhir Gupta didn’t envisage much happiness in going through life enduring the trials of a trial balance or clocking figures accrued in the profit & loss accounts of assorted businessmen. He had a keen interest in being a businessman, but needed a capital investment of at least Rs.1,00,000. With no financial backing, he somehow managed to get the amount from friends and relatives and turned entrepreneur in 1980. In 1988, bagged the first export order from Bahrain and the second one was from Dubai. He began with a 500 sq. feet factory. Today, they are operating out of three factories, totaling about 75,000 sq.ft. Manufacture about 300 machines a year and export to about 68 countries. Currently, Gupta is being lauded for his efforts in the genre of manufacturing machines for recycling and reprocessing of waste material. His firm has found success worldwide as a forerunner in designing and manufacturing state-of-the-art waste management solutions.